Late One Night
by Marathon Zack 140.6
Summary: Harry and Hermione take a late night stroll. 6th year, no particular time, light Harmony.


**A/N: Just a short little HP story I wrote for one of the students my mom tutors. So if it looks like it was written for a first grader, that's because it was. Now if it looks like it was written** ** _by_** **a first grader…**

* * *

Crookshanks strutted across the common room floor, towards the rug in front of the fireplace. The fire had died out hours ago, but there was still a little heat being given out by the coals, making it the warmest spot in the drafty castle. But as Crookshanks padded onto the rug, a pair of feet blocked his unlimited access to the rug. Sure, 90 percent of the rug was still available, but the 10 percent that was blocked by the feet was clearly the best 10 percent of the rug. So Crookshanks did the only sensible thing, and started biting the toes of said feet.

"Ow!" yelped Harry, yanking his legs up to his chest, painfully awoken by the orange ball of fur. "Oh, hi Crookshanks," he added, once he saw who it was.

Crookshanks pawed at the spot where Harry's feet had just been, before curling up on the spot and starting to purr lightly.

Harry had nearly fallen back to sleep when he heard the soft pad of feet coming across the common room.

"There you are, Crookshanks," came a female voice. "I was wondering where you'd gotten off to." Looking over, she saw Harry propped up against the couch. "Oh, hi Harry."

"Hey, Hermione," replied Harry. "What are you doing up?"

"I could ask you the same thing. But I was about to go feed Fluffy, since Hagrid is away."

"Wait. Fluffy, the three-headed dog from our first year? That Fluffy?" asked Harry, in shock.

"Hagrid let him loose in the Forbidden Forest after he was no longer needed to guard the Philosopher's Stone," explained Hermione. "He really hunts for his own food, but Hagrid made me promise to go feed him a couple times while he's away. Want to come with me?"

"Sure," said Harry, standing up and stretching.

As they walked towards the common room door, Crookshanks stood up and shook himself, before following them.

As Harry and Hermione walked down the deserted halls of the castle, with Crookshanks following close behind them, Hermione asked, "So what were you doing in the common room at two in the morning?"

Stifling a yawn, Harry replied, "I was up until about midnight finishing Snape's essay, and then I was too tired to get up and go to bed, so I just collapsed in front of the fireplace until I fell off to sleep. Then Crookshanks" — here he glanced over his shoulder at the half-Kneazle — "bit my toe and woke me up a few minutes before you came down, since apparently the only comfortable place on the entire rug is where my feet happened to be."

Hermione chuckled lightly.

By this time, they had reached the front doors of the castle, and opening them carefully, they slipped out into the courtyard. They quietly made their way down towards Hagrid's hut, before taking a sharp turn to the edge of the forest, near where the thestrals normally hung out.

"He's supposed to be near here," whispered Hermione, as they neared the edge of forest.

The bright moonlight that had lit their way from the castle was now blocked out by the overhanging gloom of the Forbidden Forest. They crept onward, under the ancient trees, towards the small clearing where they had mounted the thestrals the previous summer on their way to the Ministry of Magic.

"Shhh," said Hermione stopping suddenly, throwing out her arm to stop Harry. "Do you hear that?"

Peering in the darkness around them, they saw a large shadow slowly approaching them from the distance.

" _Lumos_ " they both said at the same time, the tips of their wands glowing bright white.

Holding their wands up in front of them, they watched the creature slowly approach them. As it got nearer to them, they could begin to make out the shapes of its three heads. When it was about 20 feet away, Crookshanks darted out from under Hermione's feet, where it had been walking slow circles, and pattered over towards the huge beast. Slowly following behind, Harry and Hermione walked up towards Fluffy.

When Crookshanks was a few feet away from its paws, the three-headed dog laid down and rested its middle head on the ground in front of Crookshanks, who proceeded to rub his head against the giant nose of the beast. Fluffy kept its other two heads trained on the approaching humans.

"Hi Fluffy, it's me, Hermione," said the young witch softly when she was a few feet away. Cautiously, she reached out her hand, and lightly petted its muzzle. Harry did the same with Fluffy's third head on the other side.

They had stood there in silence for several minutes, petting the giant dog, when they heard the sounds of someone walking through the forest towards them. And not the sounds of someone trying to be quiet, or sneak around, but the sounds of someone merely taking a stroll. Through the Forbidden Forest. In the middle of the night.

Harry and Hermione relit their wands. A moment later, Luna came strolling up to them out of the darkness, completely unconcerned about the presence of Fluffy, or anything else for that matter.

"Hi Harry. Hermione." she said in her dreamy voice. "What are you guys doing out here?"

"Hagrid asked us to feed Fluffy," replied Hermione.

"Oh that's nice. He's been lonely since Hagrid left. The Nargles aren't much company for a three-headed dog."

"What are you doing out in the Forbidden Forest in the middle of the night?" asked Harry, before Luna could go on about Nargles, or anything else that might or might not be good company for a three-headed dog, and might or might not actually exist.

"One of the Slytherins took my Bumblethorn necklace during Care of Magical Creatures class this afternoon and threw it into the forest somewhere in this direction, and I haven't had a chance to look for it until this evening."

Thinking back, Harry couldn't remember seeing Luna in the Great Hall for supper, and wondered how long she had been out here looking for her necklace.

As Harry was thinking this, Hermione said, "We'll help you look for it. What does it look like?"

"It's a silver necklace with a large Bumblethorn hung on it," replied Luna, as if everyone knew what a Bumblethorn looked like. "But you don't have to do that. I'll find it eventually."

"Don't be silly," reprimanded Hermione, "of course we'll help you look for it. _Won't we Harry?_ " she demanded, turning on her boyfriend.

"What? Yeah, of course," stuttered Harry, unsure of what exactly he was agreeing to, having missed most of the conversation trying to remember whether Luna had been at supper.

Harry and Hermione began walking around looking, their wands lit in front of them, while Luna aimlessly wandered around in the darkness, like she had been before happening across Harry and Hermione.

Ten minutes later, Harry heard Crookshanks lightly mewing, and went over to see what the cat was doing. Bending down, he saw the orange cat curled around what looked rather like a rotten, moldy tomato, and the slight gleam of what was most likely silver. Scratching Crookshanks behind its ears with his wand hand, he found the silver chain and delicately lifted it up.

"Is this it?" he called out, holding the necklace up in the air by its chain, as far away from the 'Bumblethorn' as possible. "Crookshanks found it," he said as Luna wandered up.

"Thank you, Harry," she said brightly as she took it from him, giving him a hug once she had fastened around her neck.

She then did the same with the bushy-haired witch, who had walked over once Harry aid he'd found it.

"Of course, any time," replied Hermione, returning the hug.

After they broke apart, Luna bent down and scratched Crookshanks, before wandering over and giving all three heads of Fluffy a scratch. Then she headed off through the Forbidden Forest, vaguely headed in the direction of the main castle grounds.

Harry and Hermione watched her wander away and disappear into the darkness. Harry bent down and picked up Crookshanks, who had begun wrapping itself around Harry's legs, and Harry and Hermione began a much more direct route back to the castle.


End file.
